AN: Actual AN turned out really long, am putting it as a review because I don't want to inflate the word count too badly.

.***.***.***.***.

The chrono read 0650.

Hux woke up first. Slowly drifting out of slumber, he moved an arm over the warm body that laid beside and partially on top of him. He would have drifted back to a deep slumber if the strangeness of another person didn't abruptly jolt him wide awake.

Suddenly aware of their position and not used to the touch of another person, Hux froze in place.

Lori's head rested on his shoulder. Her scarred arm laid over his chest, leaving her hand to sit on his other shoulder. He found his left arm wrapped around the woman, his hand resting near her bare hip.

Hux didn't want to move, lest he wake Lori up. After last night, he knew that he had nothing to hide from her. But something about being so exposed left him vulnerable in a way he didn't recognize.

Just as the general was wondering how to put words to the thoughts running through his head, Lori shifted in place. A small groan and a stiff stretch said she was waking up. Panicking, and not knowing what else to do, Armitage closed his eyes and pretended to be asleep.

Slowly coming too, Lori pulled at the covers before wrapping her arm back around the general. The ship was cold, and -for once- he was warm. Appreciating the feel of someone to hold and of someone holding her, Lori pulled herself closer to Armitage.

Her head brushed against the base of his neck. When it did, she felt him tense and try to quietly pull in a quick breath. Aware of the little reaction, Lori kept herself relaxed.

Last night had been lovely and vulnerable. Neither of them had given any thought to what the morning would bring, but Lori had something in mind.

"Morning, Armie."

He didn't stir at her words, but she felt him tense again.

Moving back, Lori got a good look at Armitage's face. His hair was thrown in wild directions, a far cry from the normally strictly styed look the general kept. Lori took satisfaction in the effect she had on the man. Her hair was in a similar state, and she vaguely thought of how much of a pain it would be to tie it back into a neat bun with no brush at her disposal.

When Hux didn't reply, Lori made her second comment.

"Come on, you can hear me. I know you're awake."

Knowing that he'd been found out, Hux opened his eyes to find Lori looking up at him.

He didn't move otherwise.

"Good morning."

After the heat of the moment, he'd been the one to cuddle and hold on. Now that it was morning he found himself unsure of what was and wasn't fair game. Lori had enjoyed every moment of it, and thought that now was as good a time as any to show it.

With a lazy little smile, she leaned forward and planted a little peck on the general's cheek. The moment she did, the tension dropped from the man's shoulders.

"I take it you slept well." Hux fished for something gentle to say, but he didn't quite hit the mark.

Lori heard the attempt on his words. She considered how difficult she was going to be. It was early, so she settled on something that was more a complement than anything else.

"Sure did. It didn't hurt that I was dead tired by the time you turned the lights out."

Hux felt a rush of heat race to his cheeks. Lori saw it and couldn't help but smile. If she had known the general was this prone to blushing, she would have tried to tease it out of him more often.

"Well. You certainly wore me out as well," he didn't move his arm from around her waist, nor did Lori move away from Hux's shoulder.

She let her head rest back against his chest, "sounds like you could use more regular exercise."

The tiny sarcastic edge to Loris words brought the general back to more familiar territory. Slowly finding his bearings in the conversation, Hux leaned back so that he could land a small kiss against Lori's forehead.

"Likewise, miss Gallus."

She looked up at the man, "No fair, you can't go back to calling me Miss Gallus."

"Would you rather I call you something else?" it was Hux's turn to smirk with a knowing glint in his eyes.

Lori suddenly understood what the appeal of that look was.

"I could think of something."

They pulled each other close, and would have stayed that way if Hux hadn't caught sight of the chrono.

Damn, he thought.

"If we have a repeat of last night, I might have to call you late to your own meeting."

"Hm?" Lori hummed with a small question while she twisted to check the time.

The chrono read 0720.

"Damn it." She cursed at the time.

"My sentiments exactly," Hux muttered before shifting in place.

Lori wished that they could have drawn the moment out, but she turned to leave the bed instead. The room was cold, and she fished for her undergarments all the more quickly because of it. Hux would have been content to enjoy the view, but he felt slightly dirty just watching.

Following suit, he left the bed and pulled a freshly pressed uniform from the closet.

"That's not fair either." Lori said while pulling her hair back into a pony tail that would be the base of a bun.

Hux was only missing his boots by the time Lori had found her pants and tucked her undershirt in. He finished combing his hair and putting on cologne while she searched for her belt. It had ended up underneath the wardrobe, and by the time she had it in place Hux had finished remaking the bed. With the room and themselves both put back together, the couple slipped on their respective boots at 0730.

Forgoing breakfast in lieu of a busy day, they left the suite at 0732. Lori went directly to her office, while Hux went to the interrogation wards.

The FOSB would be waiting for the would be run-aways, and the general wanted to make sure his agent didn't get caught up in the interrogations.

.***.***.***.***.

Lori stepped into the office at 0752.

The rest of the crew was already waiting on her. Wilt leaned against her desk, anxiously tapping a foot. Jenu the radar technition muttered to one of the storm troopers, the second of which stood to the side.

"We were getting worried." Wilt was the first to speak.

"Sorry, I got tied up talking to someone."

No one gave her half lie any attention.

"Either way, it looks like we're ahead of schedule. I say we get out of here."

Lori knew that the FOSB was supposed to be lying in wait aboard the ship closest to the hangar bay entrance. What she didn't know was whether or not they were in place yet.

"Hold on a second guys," she looked for something to stall with, "what's the plan after we take the upsilon? I mean, we make the jump to hyperspace first chance we get, but where too?"

"Does it matter?" Jenu spoke first.

"Not really," Lori knew better than to push too far for information, "but we better have our minds made up. It doesn't take long to scramble TIEs and it's even quicker to blast us out of the stars with one of the main turbolasers."

One of the stromtroopers took a breath in for a quick comment, but was cut off by Wilt.

"You're not wrong. I was just going to punch in the last set of coordinates and then figure it out from there."

Lori saw a few things wrong with that plan, and pointing out all of them would make for a great waste of time.

"…you do know they're factory fresh, right? There won't be any preset coordinates, they've never flown."

"Then how did they get here?" the interrupted trooper chimed in.

She gave him a questioning look, "On a shipping vessel. Because that's how things are shipped. You didn't think we just flew in a squadron of empty upsilons, did you? That would be ridiculously fuel inefficient."

Before anyone got more heated, Jenu spoke next, "ok, so no presets on the nav computer. I say we jump five parsecs in whatever direction we're facing when we get out of here, and then figure it out from there."

"Works for me, lets go." Wilt was quick to bring the conversation back on track.

Cursing the fact that she couldn't stall much longer, Lori glanced at the chrono on her desk.

0757.

Hoping that three minutes wasn't too early for the FOSB, she searched a shelf for the remote key to one of the shuttles.

Only a minute passed when Wilt made to leave the offices. Just entering the hall, he slowed to let Lori walk even with him. She was the one with the key cylinders to the hangar bay, after all. The walk to said bay was short.

No one was busy at work. Crossing the empty floor, Lori saw no sign of the agents. Walking to the agreed upon ship, she hoped that Hux's complaining about the FOSB was exaggerated.

A little click of the remote had the Upsilons loading ramp lowering. One of the troopers brought up the rear, watching for intruders. The other took a step onto the ramp, Jenu followed close behind. None of them had reason to believe that they were walking into an ambush.

Lori looked to Wilt, "After you."

The pilot only made it one step up the ramp before the blaster fire started.

Two sizzling bolts flew from the cockpit and through the passenger compartment. Jenu came running out, the trooper too dead to follow behind him. Wilt opened his mouth to shout something, but was cut off by a blaster bolt grazing his arm.

Lori wasn't about to invite a shot to the back. Hoping that the FOSB played by the same protocol as the army, she put both hands behind her head and laid face first on the ground.

Wilt rolled on the floor beside her when a booted foot stepped out of the passenger compartment. The second trooper had tried to return fire, but ended up running for it when he realized he was outgunned.

Neither the bounty hunter nor the general gave the FOSB much credit, but they had planned an ambush well. Just as the two fleeing men neared the hangar bay door, a second pair of agents stepped out from around a corner.

Not bothering to demand that the rebels stop, each agent brought an arm up. Jenu and the trooper ran head first into the agent's elbows, the force of the impact taking both to the ground.

The trooper's blaster skittered across the floor. The agent who had hit the man's helmet swore.

With their prey knocked to the ground, the team of agents didn't waste time pulling handcuffs out and making threats. Lori offered no resistance and did as she was told.

There was no telling what act she might have to put on for the interrogators later.

.***.***.***.***.

General Hux loomed over the front desk to the interrogations ward. The sergeant on duty tried not to stare at the man, but also didn't want to leave him out of sight for long. Both of them nervously glanced at the chrono on the wall.

Hux because he was impatiently waiting for the FOSB to come in with the resistance agents in tow. The desk sergeant was simply desperate for anything to look at besides the commander.

The chrono read 0830 when the front door slid open.

The sergeant was about to welcome the distraction, but the gaggle of people left her speechless and confused.

Hux already had plans for the group. Quickly counting heads, and carefully not letting his gaze linger on Lori, he found an issue.

"You're short one," he told the FOSB agent that stood at the front of the group.

Major Pleon didn't want to speak to the general almost as much as Hux didn't want to speak to him, "Check the morgue."

Noting the insolence, Hux talked on with an expected amount of distain on his features.

"How unfortunate. Take the prisoners to separate cells and leave the trained personnel to their jobs. After that, you're dismissed."

Pleon was about to remind the general that the FOSB was a separate entity from the army and that he had no authority to order them about, but Hux's reputation as a man slow to forget those that slighted him kept the major in line. With a simple nod to the rest of his group, the major and their captives moved down the hall. Hux couldn't help but notice that one of the rebels was unconscious, his feet dragging against the ground.

Turning his back on the agents, Hux looked down at the desk sergeant. She had been listening to the whole exchange, and tried to hide the fact by quickly pretending she had an urgent message to type.

Hux wasn't fooled for a second.

"Sergeant. Enter the following names into the system…"

The woman behind the desk was quick to respond. Hux was just as quick to list out a series of names. As flustered as the sergeant was, she didn't notice that the general gave one less name than there had been new prisoners in the hall.

After the prisoners were secure, the agents were quick to leave. The sergeant at the desk was only a step behind them, squeaking out something about needing to deliver a message to one of the workers deep in the interrogation ward.

Hux took the empty room as his chance to slip down the hall and to the private cells. Each had solid doors, an intentional part of their design, since they doubled as solitary confinement. Moving quickly, Hux checked the rooms as he went.

He had to walk past a few cells that held people for offences he hadn't been told about, but eventually the general came to the correct room. The door was infuriatingly slow to open, but when it did Hux was greeted by Lori nonchalantly leaning against a wall.

"Morning, general." She told him with a grin.

"As much as I would love to chat, I'm afraid we're on a time limit." Hux was aware of each second that passed as he spoke, but he did enjoy his little exchanges with Lori.

Stepping out of the cell and into the hall, Lori wasn't about to waste any more time. Moving quickly didn't keep her from noticing that Hux was willing to play along. The two of them quickly made down the hall, a short exchange of words passing between them as they went.

"We going anywhere specific?" Lori would have liked to keep the banter up, but the doors weren't truly sound proofed. Dropping the outer rim accent in favor of her wild space one was as much as she could do to disguise her voice.

Hux had a few smart comments in mind, but he too was aware that there might be eves droppers. He settled on something short, "the usual."

Just that was enough to tell Lori to meet Hux back at his suite. When they came to the end of the prison wards they took separate routes to his suite, it wouldn't do them any good to be seen together wandering the halls. The walk back to Hux's quarters didn't take either of them very long.

Nearly two hours into a shift, the halls were near deserted and no one stopped either of them to chat. Lori reached the room first, code cylinder unlocking the door for her to enter. Just a couple minutes later, Hux walked in behind her.

"Well, it's been quite the morning" the general started the conversation.

"I've had worse," Lori glanced around at the kitchen, "but I wouldn't turn down a morning meal and a nice chat."

The general walked to the refrigerator, "You could just tell me that I need to eat something instead of dancing around the topic."

"Now where's the fun in that?" her words came out over a small grin.

"I suppose there isn't any," he pulled a box from the cooler and put it into the reheater, "and as long as we're avoiding important topics…"

He trailed off, curious to see where Lori would pick the sentence up. She knew that he wanted her to take it somewhere personal. As much as Lori would have loved to, that would be far too straight forward.

Taking her time in picking a suitably difficult answer, she took a seat at the bar.

"Well, now that you mention it, I suppose my work here is done. The reports gone, the traitors are arrester, Cardinal's word is mud."

The reheater dinged to signal that the food was done. Hux didn't turn around to pull the meals from it.

"I thought we already agreed that your work would never really be finished."

Lori looked up at the general mischievous twinkle in her eye, "I suppose we did. How's payment going to work? We never did get around to making any official decisions."

With that, Hux saw an in on the conversation, "Now that you mention it, it would make sense to keep you around on retainer."

"Captains salary seems like it would to the job just fine."

"Would it now?" it was Hux's turn to get clever, "I was thinking something a little higher. How does Major Gallus sound?"

Lori had several comments to pick from. She went the one most heavily laden with double meaning.

"Sounds like a title that comes with an upgrade to a private suite."

"Now that you mention it, I suppose it does."

"Might get awful lonely. Without a bunch of roommates running around, I'm not sure how I'll cope."

The general looked down at the major, "I'm sure we can work something out."

She looked up at the man, eying the smirk to his lips and the glint in his eye.

"I think you're right."